RE: SGI computer crash

sebastien.vincent@rdls.nestle.com
Mon, 19 Apr 1999 11:36:08 +0200

> At 3:54 PM -0500 13/4/99, svpathre@mmm.com wrote:
> > I think this note should be forwarded to SGI's CEO. Considering their
> > > current business performance, SGI simply cannot afford to ignore these
> > > design faults. Have you let Bruker know about this? We as customers
> should
> > > be more aggressive in getting these issues addressed by the vendors
> and not
> > > keep doing R&D (and wasting our time) to solve their problems.
>
> We have about 70 SGI workstations on campus and have never come across the
> "design flaw" reported --- it may have been an occurance with a small
batch
> of systems but if it was widespread the community as a whole would clearly
> knpw about it. We have never lost a "mother board" to such a problem.

Hi
we had similar problems here with our spectrometers. In the end of the
installation procedure, we sort of traced the problem back to the presence
of *two* Ethernet cards in the back of the O2s, a pretty rare situation.
Irix 6.3 seem to be having hidden bugs that crash it pretty seriously. SGI
did not get too interested to solve this problem (old line of products, rare
setup), and the problem went away. We did not change much except patch Irix
6.3 to the max and remove all screen savers. Reportedly (dixit Bruker), Irix
6.5 behaves better, but we did not try.
Good luck
Sebastien

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Dr. Sebastien Vincent sebastien.vincent@rdls.nestle.com
Nestle Research Center Tel.: ++ 41 21 785 9165
Vers-chez-les-Blanc Fax: ++ 41 21 785 8925
CH - 1000 Lausanne 26, Switzerland
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